Getting a handle on what American Christian theocracy looks like

The concept of what a radical right American Christian theocracy will be is probably murky in the minds of most Americans. It is hard to mentally project exactly what that concept can entail in its impacts on society, business and government. Because of that, a series of blog posts that focus on examples of what the radical theocrats want will help make the concept more concrete and understandable. This is the first in a series of posts on Christian theocracy.

Law and Crime writes:

Norm Pattis, the controversial Connecticut attorney for Alex Jones, is now behind a federal lawsuit seeking to hold a major pharmaceutical company responsible for forcing Christian employees to violate their beliefs that their bodies are “temples of the Holy Spirit” by getting vaccinated against COVID-19.

Pattis’ firm filed suit Thursday in the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts against Takeda Pharmaceuticals, alleging claims under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for discriminating on the basis of religious beliefs. In the complaint, plaintiffs say that in Takeda’s quest to “create ‘highly-innovative medicines,'” the company “fosters a business culture and set of employment practices hostile to religious beliefs it believes might impede its scientific mission.”

The plaintiffs — a group of former employees of Takeda Pharmaceuticals — contend they were victims of religious discrimination because they were fired for refusing to get vaccinated.

According to the complaint, Takeda instituted a vaccination requirement on employees who work in or visit medical facilities that included an exception for religious objections. That exception required that an objecting employee had “sincerely held” beliefs and that accommodating those beliefs would not impose an “undue hardship” on Takeda’s business.

The lawsuit alleges that Takeda’s policy is essentially a sham. Per the complaint:

Takeda rarely, if ever, finds the religious beliefs of an employee “sincere” enough to warrant an exemption. When it cannot defeat the claims of a believer by claiming insincerity, Takeda then claims that accommodating the religious beliefs of an employee or prospective employee would pose an undue hardship on its business. The result is that Takeda almost never grants religious exemptions, in violation of Title VII.

It then goes on to detail precisely what the plaintiffs’ religious objection to the vaccine was — the debunked claim that COVID-19 vaccines contain aborted fetal cells:

The plaintiffs expressed concerns about their being required to inject a substance into their body that was developed in part by use of aborted fetal stem cells; they also asserted various claims such as their bodies being a temples of the Holy Spirit, and asserted other religious grounds sounding in faiths and practices long recognized in the United States and throughout the world.

The plaintiffs’ argument is one that has been used before in vaccine-mandate lawsuits by conservative groups. 

The plaintiffs ask for unspecified compensatory damages including lost wages and attorneys fees, as well as punitive damages.

We the Patriots, USA, Inc., the non-profit law firm that funded the litigation, released the following statement on Thursday:

Our fervent hope is that this lawsuit brings to light the fact that so many people continue to suffer as a result of the decisions that were made during the last two years. For them, the covid crisis is far from over. We are confident that we will obtain a victory for religious freedom that will ensure that discrimination against those with religious beliefs opposed to certain vaccinations is never justified in the eyes of the law.

We the Patriots is also requesting donations to offset the cost of litigation.

There is a lot to consider in this one story. A couple of points stand out:

• Theocratic Christian nationalists (CNs) do not hesitate to argue any excuse being a matter of freedom of religion, e.g., referring to humans as “temples of the Holy Spirit.” That excuse can be used to reject anything medical or nutritional that the CN movement decides is objectionable to God. That would include refusal of all vaccines and any and all medical treatments for parents and their children.

• Although conflicts among constitutional rights are common in modern society, the CN movement obliterates all of them by elevating all religion-related beliefs and activities above all other rights, social concerns and business practices. For example, the CN movement does not care about the adverse public health effects of refusal to get vaccinated. That includes injury and deaths of members of the public who do not share CN beliefs or practices.  

• The CN movement does not hesitate to resort to demagoguery, lies, deceit, slanders and crackpot reasoning to misinform and manipulate people. The CN flock is often or usually seriously misinformed. For example, COVID vaccines do not contain aborted human fetal cells. Nonetheless, the lawsuit alleges that in a court filing. That is not only a lie based on zero evidence, it is crackpot reasoning because having any cells in the main vaccines is impossible due to how the vaccines are made -- no cells are involved.

• CN elites are always asking for money. Always. That is despite massive tax breaks for religion under US tax law. Their greed is boundless. Kleptocratic in my opinion. A major core goal of the CN movement is to force taxpayers to pay for all or nearly all costs of all religious activities. If it gets in power, the CN movement will use our own tax dollars to neuter democracy, secularism and our civil liberties. CN elites want us taxpayers to pay for their own efforts to deceive, cheat, oppress and abuse us.